IMPEACHMENT: THE WITNESS

IMPEACHMENT: THE WITNESS; New Facts Help Explain Tripp's Role in Inquiry

By JILL ABRAMSON

Published: December 17, 1998

WASHINGTON, Dec. 16—
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee had originally hoped to use impeachment hearings to show that President Clinton was set up by political enemies who colluded with lawyers for Paula Corbin Jones and with lawyers from the office of Kenneth W. Starr, the independent counsel.

They wanted the motives of Mr. Clinton's pursuers to be weighed in judging the fairness of the sex and perjury case against him.

But they were largely unsuccessful. Henry J. Hyde, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, decided against calling witnesses who played an early and pivotal role in exposing the President's affair with Monica S. Lewinsky, the former White House intern. Several Democrats on the Judiciary Committee said they had wanted to call as witnesses Linda R. Tripp, Ms. Lewinsky's former confidante, Lucianne Goldberg, a New York literary agent, and a group of conservative lawyers with ties to the Jones case.

If the Senate conducts an impeachment trial, it is almost certain that Democrats will again try to raise questions about the chain of events in late 1997 and early 1998 that led Mrs. Tripp, who taped her conversations with Ms. Lewinsky, to the Jones lawyers and then to Mr. Starr's office. Although the evidence is at best ambiguous, President Clinton's lawyers and defenders contend that his pursuers set a perjury trap that ensnared him in the scandal that threatens his Presidency.

''It's part of a pattern to put attention on the prosecutors and deflect attention away from the facts,'' said Charles G. Bakaly 3d, a spokesman for Mr. Starr. ''We have flatly said there was no conspiracy or coordination between us and the Jones lawyers. It just didn't happen.''

Some new evidence about this early period emerged from the hearings, although there are still many more questions than answers. Late last week, the Judiciary Committee released a new batch of documents, including a 29-page letter from Mr. Starr and transcripts of taped conversations between Mrs. Tripp and Ms. Goldberg. These documents shed more light on Mrs. Tripp's early dealings with the Jones lawyers and with Mr. Starr's office.

Mr. Starr's letter, sent to Mr. Hyde and Representative John Conyers Jr., Democrat of Michigan, on Dec. 11, confirms that Mrs. Tripp's lawyer, James A. Moody, supplied an early and crucial piece of evidence to Mr. Starr: Ms. Lewinsky's affidavit in the Jones case.

In the affidavit, which Mr. Starr said his office received anonymously on Jan. 15, Ms. Lewinsky denied having had a sexual relationship with the President. The affidavit, which Ms. Lewinsky later admitted was false, was a catalyst for Mr. Starr to seek permission from the Justice Department to expand his Whitewater inquiry into the Lewinsky matter.

The President's defenders had earlier contended that Mr. Starr got the affidavit, which Ms. Lewinsky's lawyer had not yet filed in court, from the Jones camp. Mr. Moody, who was acquainted with lawyers who had written briefs for Ms. Jones, said in an interview this week that he is ''99 percent sure'' that he obtained the affidavit from the Jones lawyers. He said it was his idea to give the affidavit to Mr. Starr.

How and when Mrs. Tripp first contacted Mr. Starr's office has also been much-debated. In his letter to the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Starr said he had not discussed the Jones sexual misconduct lawsuit against Mr. Clinton with Richard Porter, who was once Mr. Starr's law partner at Kirkland & Ellis. Mr. Porter is friendly with several lawyers who worked on the Jones case. He also had discussions with Ms. Goldberg about how Mrs. Tripp might contact Mr. Starr's office. On Jan. 8, one of Mr. Starr's prosecutors learned of Mrs. Tripp from Jerome Marcus, another conservative lawyer with whom Ms. Goldberg had talked.

Months earlier, Mrs. Tripp and Ms. Goldberg first discussed the possibility of tipping off the Jones team about the President's affair with Ms. Lewinsky, according to a transcript of a conversation the two women had in September 1997.

''Is there any way,'' Ms. Goldberg asks, ''to have her be, uh, shall we say, reached by the Paula Jones people?''

Mrs. Tripp responds that Ms. Lewinsky, whose name she had not yet disclosed to Ms. Goldberg, has no desire to go public or hurt the President.

Mrs. Tripp testified before the grand jury that fear compelled her to tape her conversations with Ms. Lewinsky. She told the grand jury that she was worried that the President's allies might try to destroy her and that Ms. Lewinsky was pushing her to lie in the Jones case. The transcripts reveal that Mrs. Tripp and Ms. Goldberg were also interested in a book deal.

''The climate is extremely good for this kind of information,'' Ms. Goldberg tells Mrs. Tripp. Mrs. Tripp says she would have have ''no quarrel'' with taking some information to the tabloids to stimulate public interest. ''If it gets out,'' Mrs. Tripp says, ''it gets it out quick.''

Ms. Goldberg tells Mrs. Tripp she must be ready to turn on her friend, emphasizing ''you've got to really rat and you've got to tape.''

Mrs. Tripp agrees. ''This would have been a great time for a tape,'' she tells Ms. Goldberg.

By November, Mrs. Tripp was taping her conversations with Ms. Lewinsky and talking to the Jones lawyers. On Jan. 16, the day she helped Mr. Starr's investigators lure Ms. Lewinsky to the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Mrs. Tripp also briefed the Jones team about the Lewinsky-Clinton relationship. Mr. Starr has said he knew nothing about Mrs. Tripp's appointment with the Jones lawyers and in his letter he said no one from his office drove Mrs. Tripp to the appointment. Mr. Starr acknowledged on the ABC News program ''20/20'' that he should have kept better tabs on Mrs. Tripp.

On Jan. 17, in his deposition in the Jones case, Mr. Clinton was asked detailed questions about Ms. Lewinsky.

In an interview, Mr. Moody played down the importance of the meeting between Mrs. Tripp and the Jones lawyers on the eve of the President's deposition, saying he arranged the briefing so that Mrs. Tripp would not have to testify in the case. ''I did not tell Starr's office,'' he said. ''It didn't seem appropriate for me to tell them.'' Mrs. Tripp, a Pentagon employee, is working from home. Her current lawyer, Anthony Zaccagnini, said in an interview: ''She is not invested in impeachment. She has never said, 'I hope he is impeached.' ''

Photo: Monica S. Lewinsky was in New York on Tuesday for a benefit party given by the Shooting Gallery, an independent film studio. (Associated Press)